Decentralize the Decision

There are managers who feel a need to know every detail. They experience discomfort when assigning a task to someone else. On the other hand, there are employees who doubt the abilities of anyone who doesn't know every detail of the organization's life. 

Two years ago I was visiting with an employee about our company's plans. He asked me a question I didn't have the answer to, so I suggested he contact his immediate supervisor. I could tell from the employee's look that he was put off when I wasn't able to respond on the spot. 

Trying to relieve his tension, I bluntly asked if he thought I should know the answer to his question. His response? "You're the president of the company. You should know everything." Yes, I'm the president of the company, but I don't know every detail about every aspect of our business. And I don't want to. 

What kind of organization would we have if I was familiar with every detail? We would have an environment where one person ran everything. If every decision, regardless of importance, required my approval, we would suffer organizational gridlock. 

We would also have a hierarchical structure without empowered people. They couldn't grow and would not be allowed to make choices. In a nutshell, it would be a disaster. 

Leaders who have created effective organizations understand it is neither necessary nor possible to have complete knowledge of what everyone does or what they are accountable for. Instead, the leader delegates responsibilities, hoping to create a bond of mutual trust between employee and employer. 

The prevailing wisdom in our business culture is that the leader should be present to maximize organizational potential. I believe the opposite is true–a leader doesn't know how good he is until he's gone. If he leads a decentralized organization with people who think for themselves and make decisions as necessary, the organization will function well in the leader's absence. 

The decentralization of the organization and the resulting empowerment of people is, perhaps more than anything else, the factor that differentiates the effective leader from a mundane manager.